Finley's birth
My husband, Steve, and I decided to have an independent midwife as we were very keen to have continuity of care throughout my pregnancy, birth and post-natally. We liked Chrissy immediately we met her and thankfully she had 'space' for when I was due.
The antenatal appointments were all arranged to our convenience and Chrissy took my few, sometimes silly, concerns seriously and was constantly being reassuring.
We couldn’t decide between a home birth and hospital, and eventually settled for a home, water birth - primarily because we had built up a good relationship with Chrissy and felt we really trusted her. We met Caroline who was equally as nice!
The day before Finley was born (Tuesday) I was rushing around doing shopping, cleaning, taking the dog for a walk, had my legs waxed and generally ran around like a mad thing. I had a small show that morning which I told Chrissy about, but I knew this didn’t mean I was going to go into labour imminently. All the time I was aware that I had a ‘bit of a stitch’ which was more annoying than anything else and I didn’t really give it much thought. I’d had similar feelings for a week or so when I walked very quickly so just put it down to that. Also I was only 38 weeks so again it didn’t cross my mind that this might be 'it'!
At 2:00am Wednesday morning I woke up and remember thinking "bloody Braxton Hicks – I’ve had enough of these!" I drifted back to sleep only to be woken again fifteen minutes or so later. This went on for a bit and I did then begin to think that maybe Finley could be on his way. At 3.30 am I couldn’t get comfortable and decided to run a bath and have a cuppa. I crept about the house so as not to wake Steve, but he was already awake and came into the kitchen to find me groaning quietly to myself. We timed the contractions and realised they were just under 5 minutes apart – oops !
Steve called Chrissy who said she was on her way. Because I was early we hadn’t even got the pool at home yet so I decided just to get in the bath and stay there. Within about ten minutes the contractions were every 2 minutes or so and fairly uncomfortable. Chrissy arrived and stayed with me in the bathroom whilst Steve got the pool set up. The contractions seemed to get quicker and quicker and there was one or two occasions when I felt very panicky and out of control - I was aware of Chrissy telling Steve that I was in transition. She told me to try and slow my breathing down as, because I was feeling panicky, my breathing had got very fast and shallow, which was helping. I tried my hardest to concentrate on that which seemed to help.
I was now able to get into the pool which was a huge relief as our bath seemed very cramped as I couldn’t move around very freely. At one point I had to stand up because my back was aching and did some ‘wiggly’ hip movements that Chrissy had made us all do at our antenatal day (for this read: six highly embarrassed couples who’d only just met rotating their hips in all manner of ways to Britney Spears' ‘Toxic’ soundtrack!). However, joking aside, it helped hugely to loosen my back off and, no, we didn’t have Britney on in the background.
Whilst I was standing up Chrissy put a towel around me to preserve my modesty (that was one of my ‘things’ I was worried about) for which I was really grateful. I also developed an ache across the front of my pelvis which didn’t go between contractions so Caroline asked if they could see if I was retaining any urine which might be causing the problem by inserting a catheter – I hadn’t had a pee for quite a while. Whilst on the bed my waters broke with a loud ‘pop’ which made Steve leap out of the way rather quickly! I returned to the pool and the urge to push became completely overwhelming very quickly. Chrissy was now checking the baby’s heart rate every 5 minutes which was really reassuring for me and also taking my pulse which although I felt was going sky high actually stayed very low and stable throughout – I’m sure because I felt relaxed and was in very capable hands. Caroline was keeping the notes.
What was so good was that on the very few occasions Steve wasn’t in the room when I had a contraction Chrissy was instantly there encouraging me and supporting me, and on one occasion when Chrissy was out of the room (call of nature I think) Caroline was with me, so there was never a minute when I was by myself or with just Steve – which again was very reassuring to both of us.
Once my waters had broken Finley made fairly rapid progress. I had a couple of sucks of gas and air, but discontinued using this as it made me feel quite light headed. Chrissy very quietly asked me to try and breathe whilst holding onto the ‘push’ and not hold my breath during the contraction so I just tried to listen to what she was telling me and basically do as I was told! By this time I could actively feel the baby moving down and was leaning over the side of the pool hanging onto Steve’s arms. I was convinced that he was going to born out of my bottom, but was assured very definitely that he wasn’t – although I have to say I possibly argued the point on one or two occasions. Chrissy told Steve to put his hand in the water as he would be able to feel the head – he looked at me with tears in his eyes and said ‘he’s got hair’! By this point I had decided that I really didn’t like second stage and that this baby was coming out – right now ! Chrissy told me that if I had a good push and breathed when she told me he would be born with the next contraction. I just pushed with all my might (apparently I went bright red all over) and then held onto the push and breathed gently and our beautiful son was delivered by his father in warm water with the sun shining through the window at 11.21 am. Steve brought him out of the water and we looked at each other in tears and I said the immortal line ‘it’s a baby!’
I sat and cradled him in the pool with Steve’s arms around us both until the cord stopped pulsing. At that point I was helped out of the pool onto a small stool and Steve cut the cord. He then sat and held him skin to skin whilst I delivered the placenta. Chrissy then quickly examined me to see if I needed any stitches, which I didn’t. I was then wrapped up in clean towels and the three of us were settled into a comfy chair and Caroline and Chrissy disappeared to clean up the bathroom and bedroom. After about an hour I was helped into a nice warm bath and had a soak with Finley. Again Chrissy was always nearby and when I got out she was there to help and to dry my off. I then got into bed, had a lovely cup of tea and some toast and sat cuddling my son. Chrissy and Caroline cleaned up the house and by the time they left you’d never have known that anything had happened.
Chrissy came back that evening to check on us. The postnatal care Chrissy has given us has been absolutely fantastic – we had a few problems with feeding and jaundice, but she has been unfailingly supportive, reassuring and has helped us make the whole transition to being parents much easier than it would’ve been otherwise. I will miss her visits, but she will have a special place in our hearts as she helped our son come into this world in a lovely way and has helped us in more ways than we can say, and we will be eternally grateful for that.
Thank you Chrissy – you are a very special person and every woman deserves the care that you have given me.
Fiona Dawe.